


the last place you looked

by ernestdummkompf (JehanFerres)



Category: I Made America (Web Series)
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-25
Updated: 2016-06-18
Packaged: 2018-05-23 04:10:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6104488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JehanFerres/pseuds/ernestdummkompf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>in which benjamin franklin has third degree burns all over his arms and james madison is heavily sedated</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> this one actually started out as about 180 words that i wrote at 2am, which I later found during a particularly bad lecture at college and then actually finished writing. honestly i'm pretty pleased with this; it's the first founding father-related fan fiction i've started and actually finished. that is not a sentence i was ever expecting to type.

“Ben?”

“Eh?” Franklin gingerly moved his shoulders to allow Madison to continue lying on him without jogging the burns on his arms and turning to look at Hamilton.

“He is… uninjured, is he not?” Hamilton looked away as soon as he had spoken. “I don’t know that I could live with myself if he had been hurt as a result of my inaction.” He leaned back against the doorjamb to disguise the fact that he was shaking slightly.

“From what I can tell he is, yes.” Franklin winced slightly as the back of his forearm grazed the arm of the sofa, but continued. “He seems to be sedated, but in a sense...” He shrugged, leaning back to look at Hamilton properly.

“And you don’t mind staying up to watch him?” Hamilton sunk down the wall to sit, cross-legged, on the floor, leaning his head against the frame of the door. “I would offer to keep you company, but…” He gestured to the room that he now shared with Adams.

“I offered to because I perceive very little sleep in my future.” He raised his arms slightly.

“Ah. Yes. How bad is it?” Hamilton asked.

“I cannot think right.” Franklin grimaced. “I cannot think at all.”

“And the… the plastic wrap? Is it helping?”

“Considerably more than Jefferson’s previous attempt to bandage them. As the plastic is not sticking to the burns, I consider it a triumph,” Franklin said, without a trace of irony. Hamilton felt nauseous at the thought.

Madison, curled up beside Franklin under a pile of blankets and pillows and with his arms pulled up over his head, mumbled incoherently to himself. Franklin leaned down, gently patting Madison’s side and muttering reassuringly to him.

“Thank God for the internet,” Franklin said dryly. “That said, I ought to change these.” He reached down behind Madison’s back for the roll of plastic wrap. “I’m sorry. Would you mind…?”

“Certainly.” Hamilton got to his feet before coming to sit beside Franklin. “What do you need me to do?”

“I can attend to removing these,” Franklin said, sliding a fingernail underneath the edge of the plastic. He had only wrapped it around his arm once, so removing it didn’t take too long. He cringed and waited for a moment for the worst of the pain from the air hitting the burns to subside, before Hamilton carefully replaced it.

“That was bad.” Against his better judgement, Franklin cradled his left arm in his right hand, before realising how painful it was and trying to find a slightly more comfortable and less painful way to hold his arms.

“I guessed,” Hamilton agreed, sighing and looking towards Madison.

He had seemed to be waking up earlier, but he hadn’t moved since. Hamilton assumed that either Franklin had a particularly developed ability to calm Madison (which was not entirely out of the question) or whatever he had been sedated with had not started to wear off.

“Are you sure he is alright?” Hamilton asked, looking at Madison. In response, Franklin carefully moved some of the blankets back from around Madison’s neck to feel for a pulse without accidentally rousing him, if he was even capable of doing so. Hamilton looked worried.

“A little sluggish,” Franklin said as he lifted his hand away, “but nothing to be concerned about.”

“You’re sure?” Hamilton watched Franklin pull the blankets back up around Madison with an expression of concern.

“Given his recent misadventures, no better or worse than we might anticipate,” Franklin said softly, leaning his head back against the pillows behind his shoulders. “How do you feel?” he asked, as Hamilton got to his feet and started to walk away.

Wrong-footed even though he knew that Franklin really only wanted company, Hamilton turned to look at him properly. “Honestly? Dreadful.” He stayed stood up, but turned to face Franklin, who had drawn one knee up against his chest and was looking at him out of half-closed eyes. “I mean,” he sighed, “I’m the one who lost him while you were all out and now…” He gestured to the pile of Madison on the sofa and Franklin’s burned arms.

Franklin shrugged. “Perhaps you were to blame for his initial going missing; you are free to believe that if it makes you feel better, but it isn’t for me to say,” Franklin said, his tone blunt. “But,” he said, before Hamilton had the chance to leave, “nobody could have anticipated the end result. I am not an idiot, and I would have to be one to say that I would have expected it. So I will not.” Franklin shrugged.

“I shall make what I will of that,” Hamilton muttered, putting it down to the painkillers that Ben had been taking making him fuzzy-minded but not doing anything for the amount of pain he was in. “I ought to retire, Doctor Franklin. Goodnight.” He bowed tersely, and turned to go to bed without waiting to see if Franklin reciprocated the gesture.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IT'S A FLASHBACK CHAPTER
> 
> not sure whether to alternate flashback chapters with chapters like the previous chapter or just make everything chapters set in the last episode of s1. regardless, enjoy The Suffering.
> 
> this took me like half an hour to write because i, like butter, am on a roll.

“We need to find Adams.” Franklin’s ability to be practical sometimes annoyed Jefferson, but now that they were in this situation he was more than relieved, even as Franklin grabbed his wrist and pulled him away at a run.

Franklin knew roughly how long it would take them to get across Chicago to the assembly room where Adams was making his announcement, but it was too long. Seventeen minutes, he knew both as a scientist and as a human being, could easily ruin their chances of ever seeing Madison again.

“How should we…?” He skidded to a halt ahead of Jefferson as they reached the door to the building where the six of them lived. “We’ll get there too late if we go on foot but neither of us drive and we-“

“Franklin.”

“We know he’s _here_ , Thomas. Or nearby, but-“

“ _Franklin_!” Jefferson all but yelled, drawing it out somewhat in the hopes of actually being able to get Ben’s attention. “Think. How does the general get to work?” He leaned forward slightly, cradling his arm over his ribs in the hopes that his breathing would get back to normal sometime soon. Even in this position, however, he could see Franklin’s eyes widen.

“Here.” Without straightening up, Jefferson tossed his phone into Franklin’s hand. This was the only time he had ever been glad of the fact that he had never put a passcode on his phone. “I saved him as General Washington.”

“General Washington, sir. Are you heading out to Adams’ address?” Franklin wheezed.

“ _Franklin? I wouldn’t miss it for the world._ ” Jefferson couldn’t help but be glad that Franklin had put the phone on speaker. “ _Why do you ask? And what are you doing calling me from Jefferson’s telephone?_ ”

“I don’t have time to explain,” Franklin said. “We are outside the apartment building, sir. Are you able to pick us up on your way there?” he asked. Jefferson looked up. Franklin cringed.

“ _It is done._ ” The General sounded a little baffled. “ _I shall be seven minutes._ ”

“Thank you, sir,” Franklin said, leaning his head back against the wall as he hung up. Seeing that he wouldn’t get it back organically, Jefferson took the phone back from him. Franklin slid down the wall to sit with his arms wrapped around his knees, and Jefferson crossed one foot over the other.

While Doctor Franklin was generally good company – especially after a little alcohol – him being in something of a panic, as he had been since Madison had disappeared, made him surly at best and downright unpleasant at worst. However, as his style of dress was so different from that of the future, Jefferson always felt uncomfortable being out on his own in Chicago, so even Franklin’s company was more than welcome.

Washington’s estimation of how long he would be was, it turned out, completely right. Seven minutes after Franklin had called, the General drove up. He cast the two of them a slightly confused look as Franklin, who had discovered the hard way that he threw up if he sat in the back seat of a car, and Jefferson got in. “There is very little traffic,” Washington’s tone was blunt but calm.

“How long?” Jefferson asked from the back seat of the car.

“At the speed limit, fifteen minutes. Why?” he asked, glancing over at, Franklin, who was distractedly turning Madison’s hat over in his hands and running his thumb along the edge of the brim. “Doctor Franklin.”

Franklin cast a look over to Washington to acknowledge that he had been questioned, but said nothing, whereupon Jefferson began to explain. “When we arrived back at the apartment the place looked like it had been broken into.”

“And had it?” Washington asked, his tone deceptively calm.

“No. Or… well, not that we think,” Jefferson said, pulling his wig off and running his hands through his hair and pulling at a lock that was growing faster than the rest. “But…” He gestured to the hat that Franklin held.

“You will need to explain,” Washington said.

“Madison’s hat,” Jefferson explained bluntly. “The place looked trashed.”

Washington nodded seriously, bringing the car to a halt outside the hall. “Could this be that the Fishwife’s handlers found out about John’s plans to run for the presidency again?” he asked.

Franklin finally looked up, and looked over at Jefferson. “We need to warn them. Him and Hamilton,” he said, cringing at the idea of more of their group going missing.

“No, Franklin. That is not necessarily the case, is it?” Jefferson said, glaring at him through the rear view mirror, but then feeling slightly guilty when he heard Franklin start agitatedly grinding his teeth. “Because you and Hamilton have been-“

“Jefferson.” Washington fixed him with a stern look.

“We kept it from you because it is _irrelevant_!” Franklin said, his voice suddenly pitched up an octave.

“A truce to this fooling. We have to warn Adams and Hamilton,” Washington said darkly, opening his door and waiting for Franklin and Jefferson to get out of the car before he also did so. “Come on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YOU STOP THAT, THE FOUNDING FATHERS. GET ON BETTER.
> 
> also frankie's tooth-grinding is something that i have decided is a thing.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> here's another chapter, because after writing 1.5 essays for college today the first thing i needed to do was write a chapter of Founding Father Suffering. I HAD TOO MUCH FUN WITH THIS I APOLOGISE.

“Ben! Wait; he’ll-” Jefferson grabbed for Franklin’s sleeve and pulled him back, getting Ben’s elbow to the face for his troubles. He groaned and pulled Franklin around by his arm roughly, but (once again) felt guilty when he saw Franklin’s expression. “We cannot move yet. He knows we’re following him; it might be a trap,” he hissed, trying to put as little space as was comfortable between his and Franklin’s faces. “If one of us got hurt, then we would be unable to help.”

Franklin pulled away, grinding his teeth uncomfortably. Jefferson sighed, knowing better than to try and pull Franklin back round now that he was this agitated, and instead turned to look at Hamilton and Washington, both of whom looked just as ready to run to their possible deaths as Franklin, who had since turned his back to the other three, had been a moment before.

Jefferson briefly congratulated himself for single-handedly saving all their lives, before getting out of his own ego and back to the real world.

Hamilton looked just about as agitated as he ever was, so Jefferson was completely unsurprised by the fact that he was gripping Washington’s upper arm with white knuckles, but just how angry the General looked surprised Jefferson the slightest bit. While he knew that during the Revolution he had been formidable, he seemed to have softened slightly since arriving in the future.

“Gentlemen,” Washington said, loudly enough to catch Franklin’s attention but not loudly enough to be overheard (or so he hoped. Modern technology was lost on him so nothing, especially not a listening device, would have been a surprise to him). “We have waited long enough.”

Even in the relative dark, his pupils were small enough to barely be visible. “Either we go _now_ or we risk losing Madison permanently.”

This would have been enough to make Franklin go immediately – hell, before immediately if he was given half a chance – had Jefferson not grabbed his arm and pulled him back. Washington briefly cast him a thankful look, before continuing. Jefferson didn’t take his hand off Franklin’s wrist. Washington nodded the slightest bit.

Jefferson was the first to run. He dragged Franklin along with him for the first few paces but Franklin caught up quickly, and neither needed to look back or listen to know that Washington and Hamilton were right behind them. Franklin rounded the corner ahead of Jefferson, and Jefferson himself had to skid to a half to avoid colliding with the taller man’s back. Washington and Hamilton stopped themselves more successfully behind.

Franklin held a hand up, and Jefferson couldn’t tell whether he was telling the others to stop or something else, but he was too distracted by the car in front of them. Black and cleaned to within an inch of its life, nothing would have been amiss about the vehicle if not for the missing numberplate.

Franklin, however, wasn’t looking at the numberplate, or at the car at all.

He was focussed – and Jefferson could tell, even looking at his back, that this was what Franklin was staring at – on a collapsed shape in the back of the car. And even without any strange powers caused by traveling through time, Jefferson knew for a fact that Franklin thought that must be Madison.

Washington pulled the two of them back by the cuffs of their frock coats. “Stay back here. You were too easily visible,” he hissed, releasing the two of them once he was certain that nothing was going to go wrong. Franklin didn’t take his eyes off the car, even as the driver’s side door opened and a furtive figure climbed out. A couple of seconds later, a second man got out of the other side.

“You’re sure we won’t be found out?” Jefferson recognised that voice, but he couldn’t place it.

“Just do it, Richard.” The first figure fished into his pocket and tossed something over the car to the second, before getting back in, starting the engine, and hurrying back out again, backing a good six feet away from the car.

Franklin, beside Jefferson, tensed. “The handler…” Jefferson clamped his hand over Franklin’s mouth to keep him from saying anything more, shushing him without breaking eye contact with the car. Franklin slowly pushed Jefferson’s hand down and off his face.

“Ben…” Jefferson whispered, grabbing at Franklin’s hand. Franklin squeezed his fingers tightly. “What do we do?” Jefferson hissed, although he knew that he would get no answer, even as a small light flicked on over by the car.

“Madison…” Hamilton sounded horrified, something that Jefferson had never heard from him before.

Jefferson grabbed at the front of Ben’s jacket to keep him from trying to run in to the fray, but found that he didn’t need to. Franklin didn’t even seem to notice that Jefferson was touching him, although his grip on Jefferson’s hand remained bone crushing.

It was only when the left rear wheel-arch of the car began to smoke that any of the four men moved. Jefferson shoved Franklin back, and ran towards the car, he and Franklin reaching it just as the vehicle began to burn in earnest.

“Franklin! Wait!- Fuck-” Jefferson tried to say two things at once as the two men who had been in the car ran in the other direction and Hamilton and Washington finally snapped out of their stupor and ran towards the car.

Half of the car was ablaze now, but Franklin had somehow managed to get Madison out. The smaller man was a dead weight in his arms, and Franklin himself was shuddering violently, his face pale even for him. Jefferson, along with Hamilton and Washington, had the forethought, or mental function in general, to move out of the way as the rest of the car went up in flames, but Franklin didn’t move.

It might have been that the sight of the fire and Franklin standing in front of it made the rational part of Jefferson’s brain suddenly wake back up, but whatever happened made Jefferson pull Franklin back, and it brought Franklin back to himself as well. Unfortunately, “back to himself” involved enormous burns on his arms.

Franklin could feel that he was about to faint. Rather than sacrificing Madison – because he would never be a soft landing, not in a million years – he all but threw the smaller man into Jefferson’s arms, before his eyes rolled back into his head and he fell on his face onto the tarmac.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so, i'll level with ya': i know you americans don't call numberplates numberplates, but i am not an american; i am from england, and so i will use whatever vernacular i like.
> 
> anyway, that was exciting. (also, will i ever be happier with a line than i am with the line about jefferson's ego? no. no i will not. it is physically impossible.)
> 
> finally: if you do not like canon divergence i am extremely sorry. i just HAD to set fire to something. just be glad it wasn't madison tbh.


	4. Chapter Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> time to suffer, i guess. also this took me FAR too long to write i am apology. in other news: hamilton is Angst.

Adams smiled self-consciously, mentally preparing to receive the bollocking of a lifetime for straying from the pre-agreed script. Instead, however, his manager looked most worried than angry as he approached. “There is a car on fire outside.” He was leaning close to Adams’ ear, clearly trying to feign congratulating the former president on his success.

“Right. What ought we to do?” Adams asked, before looking around for Hamilton, Franklin, Jefferson and Washington. He panicked for a brief moment when he realised that they were nowhere to be seen, before turning back to his manager.

“Yeah. They ran off a few sentences in.” The look that Adams was receiving said everything. “Stay put.”

“My friends may be hurt, and you suggest that I ‘stay put’?”

Adams knew that it was petty, but he was still utterly incensed. He ran his fingers through the hair at the back of his wig. “I am no coward; I cannot abandon my friends.”

It had been a while since he had been anything but mild-mannered; even with Hamilton he just felt exasperated rather than angry; but all that had happened in the past five weeks since Madison’s disappearance had finally caught, infuriatingly, up to him. “You are more than welcome to stay put,” he said as he turned to leave.

“Adams!” When he saw a wild-eyed Hamilton, his wig slightly askew, approaching him, Adams managed to shake his feeling of annoyance, instead spinning the two of them into the wall so that they could talk relatively privately. “John, thank God,” Hamilton said, leaning down close to Adams and resting his head on his shoulder.

“What has got into everybody?” Adams asked, somewhat rhetorically, as Hamilton grabbed at his arms and leaned his head down so that he and Adams were practically nose to nose.

“Listen,” Hamilton hissed, “rather than starting.”

“Are you propositioning me?” Adams asked dryly.

“Of course,” Hamilton replied, in the same tone of voice. “John. Listen. We… found Madison.”

“What? Where is he? Is he hurt?” Adams started to move, but Hamilton stopped him.

“He isn’t hurt, just unconscious, but Doctor Franklin is,” Hamilton said. He straightened up and looked around furtively, as though the source of Madison’s unconsciousness and Franklin’s injuries could be somewhere in the room, until his eyes lighted back on Adams, who had the look of a man who had just had a significant revelation.

“How are we returning home?” Adams asked.

Hamilton’s wild-eyed look almost disappeared. “Jefferson is going back with Franklin and Madison in Washington’s car. We ought to…” He made a face. “Are you objected to walking, John? I need to clear my head.” He made a gesture near to his temple, and Adams nodded.

“We ought to return to the others before we do so,” Adams said. He assumed that Hamilton had been panicked when he had left the others, and that they would be at least somewhat concerned for him. “Come.”

Adams’ manager was, it turned out, right about there being a car on fire. More worryingly than the fire, though, was the fact that George Washington had Benjamin Franklin slumped against him, his arm across his shoulders, while Jefferson, looking midway between shell-shocked and furious, was holding Madison, unconscious, against his chest.

Adams probably would have collapsed too, or at least ended up on the floor, if Hamilton hadn’t grabbed him when he’d started to sway and hastily carted him away. When they were sufficiently far away from the others – not to mention the burning car – Adams, leaning woozily against the wall, finally took the time to see if Hamilton was alright. Damage control, he believed it was called.

“For the most part, I was with the General,” Hamilton said, once they had both recovered enough to be able to talk. He had grabbed hold of Adams’ arm for mutual support, and seemed to be staring off into the distance. “I didn’t see a great amount of what happened. But what I did was incredibly unpleasant.” He shuddered almost theatrically, leaning against Adams’ side. John put his head against his shoulder.

“And Madison…?” He looked up.

“I can’t say with any certainty, but he hardly looked alive, let alone conscious.

Usually none of the six founders were capable of going to bed at a normal time except for Madison, who would probably sleep for sixteen or seventeen hours at a stretch if he was allowed to, and Franklin, who was nothing if not inconsistent with going to bed. Some nights he would retire at nine in the evening, others at two in the morning, and others every hour in between. His only stipulation was that he would consistently go to bed more or less on the hour.

However, tonight all of the others were, when Hamilton and Adams returned home, apparently asleep, or if they were not they were oddly quiet. Hamilton was loth to switch on the light when he opened up the door, but he eventually managed to force himself to.

Franklin appeared not to have gone to bed, instead sitting on the sofa with Madison. Hamilton cast him an uncomfortable smile as he hung up his and Adams’ coats and hats, as well as removing both his own set of keys and Adams’ from their coat pockets to hang them up in their proper place. He could see that Franklin was awake from the way his eyes followed him lazily, but he seemed not to be in the mood for communication.

Adams having already gone to bed, Hamilton decided, after about a half bottle of wine, that he should also retire. He had decided that he was too far gone to attempt to talk to Franklin or (if he was even conscious) Madison, and instead fell onto the bed (and Adams’ chest) still in his clothes.

**Author's Note:**

> you stop that, franklin. do not antagonise your friends.


End file.
